02/03/2011

(ENG) Twenty years ago, Mexican architect Juan José Santibañez helped 20 poor women to build their own house. He designed the drawings and helped with the construction. The result was a success.

Two decades later, after the inspiration and knowledge acquired by Juan Santibañez, blaanc and CaeiroCapurso relaunched the project, taking it one step further by creating the Association Adobe for Women.

The goal of the association is to contribute to a more human and sustainable use of the planet’s resources and at the same time recover traditional construction techniques by using local materials such as earth and adobe bricks.

The first Project’s goal is to help 20 women from the indigenous village of San Juan Mixtepec in the State of Oaxaca, Mexico to build 20 sustainable houses. The women who are either widows or single mothers will help by providing manpower during the construction process in order to reach their life time dream of having a home they can call their own.

The association need to raise 76 616.80€ to reach their first goal.

They rely entirely on voluntary donations. The tiny team ensures even the smallest contributions go a long way.

Parallel to the donations made directly to the Association Adobe for Women, Cameron Sinclair, co-founder of Architecture for Humanity, has decided to help impulse this idea. He has launched a Kickstarter campaign (an on-line fund-raising tool for cool projects) for Adobe for Women.